Biden Brands Assange “terrorist” – Washington’s contempt for law and rights


Biden brands WikiLeaks leader “terrorist” and criminal
By Patrick Martin 
20 December 2010
US Vice President Joseph Biden made the highest-level public attack on WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange since the organization began publishing secret US diplomatic cables, calling Assange a “high-tech terrorist” and agreeing with a suggestion that the organization’s activities are “criminal.” Biden was interviewed on the NBC program Meet the Press, broadcast Sunday morning.
“Look, this guy has done things that have damaged and put in jeopardy the lives and occupations of people in other parts of the world,” the vice president said, in response to a question from interviewer David Gregory. The leaks of US diplomatic cables have “made it more difficult for us to conduct our business with our allies and our friends,” Biden continued, adding, “There is a desire now to meet with me alone rather than have staff in the room.”
The discussion of Assange came as part of a longer interview conducted Saturday. Gregory raised the issue with a suggestion that the United States “do something to stop Mr. Assange,” a question that Biden chose to deflect. “The Justice Department is taking a look at that,” he said. “I’m not going to comment on that process.”
Biden continued, “I would argue that it’s closer to being a high-tech terrorist than the Pentagon papers.”
Gregory did not ask about the calls from right-wing media pundits and some congressmen and senators that Assange should be seized by the CIA or assassinated outright. The Obama administration has proclaimed its right to assassinate anyone, including an American citizen, that the president designates as a “terrorist,” so applying that label to Assange is equivalent to declaring him fair game for CIA hit squads.
Biden's claim that Assange has endangered the lives of US diplomats and informants is one that US government spokesmen have reiterated repeatedly in the weeks since the WikiLeaks revelations began, without ever providing a shred of evidence.
Moreover, only two days before the interview, Biden admitted that he didn’t see “any substantive damage” from the WikiLeaks exposures.
The accusations of “terrorism” add credence to the warnings made by Assange himself that his life is “under threat.” Speaking to reporters outside Ellingham Hall, the home in rural Norfolk where he is effectively under house arrest, Assange said, “There is a threat to my life. There is a threat to my staff. There are significant risks facing us.”
Assange also charged American financial corporations with practicing “business McCarthyism,” after Bank of America shut down all transactions to the WikiLeaks web site on Saturday. The bank followed the example of PayPal, MasterCard, Visa and other US-based financial institutions that have responded to US government pressure by cutting off Internet and wire transfers to WikiLeaks.
“It’s a new type of business McCarthyism in the US to deprive this organisation of the funds that it needs to survive, to deprive me personally of the funds that my lawyers need to protect me against extradition to the US or to Sweden,” Assange told Agence France Presse.
Bank of America may have had an additional reason for acting against WikiLeaks, since Assange has said the organization is in possession of data that would support a “megaleak” about a major US bank “early next year.” He told the business magazine Forbes that the leak would provide details of “unethical practices.”
Assange also amplified his criticism of the trumped-up sexual assault charges being pursued by Swedish prosecutors, the basis for his nine-day incarceration in Wandsworth prison on an extradition warrant.
“The case in Sweden is a travesty in the way it has been conducted,” he said. “No person should be exposed to that type of investigation or persecution. It’s not performed in an open way, there are lots of underhanded dealings, giving out selected materials that we don’t even have.” He added that there were unconfirmed reports that at least one of the two witnesses has repudiated her role in the prosecution.
Also on Saturday, the British newspaper that has published some of the most damning US diplomatic cables, the Guardian, published a long and vile account of the allegations against Assange, based on what it called “unauthorized access” to “police material held in Stockholm.” In other words, the newspaper chose to be a conduit for police smears against Assange.
The account, with numerous lurid details but no actual evidence, comes from the newspaper with which Assange has collaborated most closely. It was written by the same journalist, Nick Davies, who established the Guardian’s connection to WikiLeaks.
Nothing in the long article controverts Assange’s repeated declarations that his relations with both women were consensual. The article also confirms that the two women did not go to the police to complain of rape, but rather to compel Assange to have an HIV test. After Assange agreed to the test, it was the Swedish police who took the initiative to transform the case into an allegation of sexual assault.
According to a statement by one of Assange’s lawyers in Britain, “his Swedish lawyer has been shown evidence of their text messages which indicate that they were concerned to obtain money by going to a tabloid newspaper and were motivated by other matters including a desire for revenge.”
In point of fact, however, no charge has actually been made. Assange was jailed on an extradition warrant from Swedish prosecutors seeking to question him after he left the country. Assange repeatedly offered his testimony before leaving Sweden, with permission, to attend to WikiLeaks business in London.
Vaughan Smith, who is Assange’s Norfolk host, told the Independent newspaper that the Guardian article appeared to be politically motivated. “I don’t think it delivers any new revelations,” he said. “I’m sad to read it. The article was critical and I wondered to what extent the Guardian maintains a level of criticism politically to keep off the flak of publishing the leaks. I wonder how much of this is politics. It hasn’t made me think that Julian is guilty but it makes me think, perhaps, newspapers feel the need to put in criticism.”
Meanwhile, on Friday, Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard was compelled to retract her declaration that Assange and WikiLeaks were “illegal,” admitting that after consulting with federal police, “The advice is that there have been no breaches of Australian law.”


-----

Cables expose Washington’s contempt for international law, democratic rights
By Barry Grey 
20 December 2010
Secret cables published in recent days by WikiLeaks reveal the efforts of the United States to thwart the exposure by the Council of Europe and the International Criminal Court (ICC) of human rights violations by the US and its allies. The cables, among the more than 250,000 State Department documents leaked to the web site, reflect the hostility and contempt of both the Bush and Obama administrations for democratic rights and international law.
A series of cables dispatched in September and October of 2009 give vent to the disdain of Washington for the Council of Europe, which monitors human rights in 47 European nations. The Council in Strasbourg oversees the European Court of Human Rights.
In the likely event that WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange faces extradition to the United States, the European Court of Human Rights will become his last court of appeal in opposing such action.
The cables from 2009, drafted by Vincent Carver, the consul general at the US embassy in Strasbourg, express US vitriol over the Council’s earlier exposures and condemnations of Washington’s policy of rendition—in which alleged terrorists are abducted and transported to a third country, where they face interrogation and torture without any legal protections—and the complicity of European governments in the US practice. The Council has also exposed and denounced secret CIA “black site” prisons in Europe and elsewhere.
A cable marked “classified” from March of 2009 is headlined “Council of Europe: More Effective Around the Edges than at the Core.” It begins: “The Council of Europe (COE) likes to portray itself as a bastion of democracy, a promoter of human rights, and the last best hope for defending the rule of law in Europe—and beyond. It is an organization with an inferiority complex and, simultaneously, an overambitious agenda. In effect, it is at its best in providing technical assistance to member-states and at its worst in tackling geo-political crises.”
The cable was sent in advance of a visit to Washington by the then-secretary general of the Council, Terry Davis of the UK. Carver disparages Davis, who was preparing to leave office that summer, as an “unpopular lame duck.” Davis had vocally opposed some attempts by the US to extradite Europeans and had denounced US renditions and secret CIA prisons.
Carver writes that the Council “receives (rightfully, in our view) neither the level of funding nor the attention from member-states that other regional organizations, such as the EU and the OSCE (Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe) receive.”
Of the European Court of Human Rights, Carver writes: “The ECHR will block the extradition of prisoners to non-COE countries if it believes they would be subject to the death penalty or torture. It has also requested more information on pending British extradition cases to the US where it believes the prisoners might be sentenced in the US to life imprisonment with no possible appeal or automatic judicial review of the life sentence.”
Carver proceeds to denounce the Council for blocking efforts led by its Eastern European members to condemn Russian actions in Georgia.
“Finally,” the cable continues, “we turn to one issue where the COE (Council of Europe) has been both an irritant and, more recently, somewhat of a champion—Guantanamo.” Carver singles out Dick Marty, a member of the Swiss delegation and an investigator for the Council, who “conducted an investigation into renditions and ‘secret prisons’ in Europe connected to the US war on terrorism. His work created a great deal of controversy and anti-US sentiment in the COE.”
Marty issued reports in 2006 and 2007 documenting US renditions involving European states, describing them as “criminal acts” which “ run counter to the laws that prevail in all civilized countries today.” He also exposed the existence of CIA secret prisons in Poland, Romania and other locations around the world.
Carver wrote more favorably about the role of Secretary General Davis and COE Human Rights Commissioner Thomas Hammarberg in calling on Council member-states to accept Guantanamo detainees and help the US close the facility.
A second cable from September 2009 deals with the imminent election of a new Council secretary general to replace Davis. Carver urges the State Department to quickly arrange a meeting between a “ranking Department official” and Davis’ successor (and current secretary general) Thorbjørn Jagland, former prime minister of Norway.
“Jagland can be expected to criticize the US for the death penalty,” Carver writes. “He may, however, be less enthusiastic than the previous SecGen Terry Davis (UK) in publicly criticizing renditions, particularly if we review the issues with him soon.”
A third cable deals with US efforts to shape the deliberations on climate change of the Council’s Environment Committee in accordance with Washington’s policy of placing the onus for emissions reductions on emerging economies such as China and India. It states: “Former White House adviser Kathleen McGinty effectively outlined her views of the Obama administration’s commitment to fighting climate change to the… Environment Committee September 29. CG underscored the need for all countries, including developing ones, to cut carbon emissions as part of any agreement coming out of the Copenhagen conference.”
The cable notes a move to add a protocol to the European Convention of Human Rights on the “right to a healthy environment,” but adds, approvingly, that “one western ambassador told us the CEO’s Council of Ministers ‘will bury’ the proposal.”
Another set of cables from 2003 reflect US hostility to the International Criminal Court, established by the United Nations in 2002 to prosecute individuals for war crimes, crimes against humanity and genocide, up to and including government leaders. The US has refused to join the court on the grounds that Americans must be exempt from the operations of such an international judicial body.
One cable, sent in July 2003, reflects Washington’s fears that the court might prosecute US and British war crimes in Iraq. The cable, sent three months after the election of Argentinean Luis Moreno-Ocampo as chief prosecutor, states: “Less clear are [Ocampo’s] views on Iraq. Ocampo has said that he was looking at the actions of British forces in Iraq—which led a British ICTY (International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia) prosecutor nearly to fall off his chair.
“Privately, Ocampo has said that he wishes to dispose of Iraq issues (i.e., not to investigate them).”
The US had good reason to fear prosecution for war crimes, having just carried out the unprovoked invasion of Iraq on the basis of outright lies.
More recent cables reflect Washington’s strong opposition to any expansion of the court’s role. The Obama administration opposed “crimes of aggression” being added to the list of those within the ICC’s jurisdiction. The crime is defined as one “committed by a political or military leader which, by its character, gravity and scale, constituted a manifest violation of the [UN] Charter.” It was adopted as falling within the purview of the court in June.
US efforts to subvert and manipulate international organizations such as the Council of Europe and the ICC underscore Washington’s repudiation of the Nuremburg principles, which define the planning and launching of aggressive war as a war crime. In their place, the American ruling class has adopted the doctrine of preemptive war, a rationalization for the unilateral use of military force against any country deemed a threat or even a potential threat to US imperialist interests.

-----

Many opinions exist of the nature and meaning of the whistle blowing organization Wikileaks. This is appropriate. Imperialism attacks on many fronts at the same time.

Wikileaks and Julian Assange are not “revolutionary” in the typical sense. But it seems clear to this observer that their existence and continued work can make invaluable contributions in the struggle against oppression and inequality, war and the waste of human lives that is the hallmark of capitalism. In order for the materials brought to light by wikileaks to have a revolutionary effect, revolutionaries and progressives the world over must take responsibility for the analysis and dissemination of their content. Clearly people, the corporate press has no interest nor intention of doing this for us.

Let progressive people everywhere join in the effort to prevent further attacks on Wikileaks and its staff. In this critical period in human history this is not a battle we can afford to lose. Please adjust the quantity and quality of your “fightback” with this in mind.

Please share this call widely across Europe and the world. General Joe

PS: How many millions of people in the streets does it take to prevent an extradition? The planning and organizing should begin now.

-----

Details for further publishing below:

Biden Brands Assange “terrorist” – Washington’s contempt for law and rights

General Joe and friends

“Wikileaks and Julian Assange are not “revolutionary” in the typical sense. But it seems clear to this observer that their existence and continued work can make invaluable contributions in the struggle against oppression and inequality, war and the waste of human lives that are the hallmark of capitalism. In order for the materials brought to light by wikileaks to have a revolutionary effect, revolutionaries and progressives the world over must take responsibility for the analysis and dissemination of their content. Clearly people, the corporate press has no interest nor intention of doing this for us.

Let progressive people everywhere join in the effort to prevent further attacks on Wikileaks and its staff. In this critical period in human history this is not a battle we can afford to lose. Please adjust the quantity and quality of your “fightback” with this in mind.”